Sad memorials to stores’ strife

FANCY picking up some tights in the same place as a garlic crusher? Well, you could be struggling as research shows that the UK has lost 83 per cent of its department stores in the five years since the collapse of BHS.

Commercial property group CoStar tracked the footprint of chains from Debenhams to Beales to House of Fraser. Where once 467 stores were sprinkled across the country, now only 79 exist. The group also tracked what happened to the buildings that housed the shops once they had closed down – and found that of the 388 sites vacated, 237 are still lying empty.

It is a crying shame to see once-bustling high streets transformed over the past few years – particularly as some of the biggest online retailers that have taken much of the trade are basically glorified digital department stores themselves.